Plutarch’s Lives

Timoleon

Translated by John Dryden
and
Revised by Arthur Hugh Clough

It was for the sake of others that I
first commenced writing biographies; but I find myself proceeding and
attaching myself to it for my own; the virtues of these great men
serving me as a sort of looking-glass, in which I may see how to adjust
and adorn my own life. Indeed, it can be compared to nothing but daily
living and associating together; we receive, as it were, in our
inquiry, and entertain each successive guest, view—

“Their stature and their qualities,”

and select from their actions all that is noblest and worthiest to know

“Ah, and what greater pleasure could one have?”

or, what more effective means to one’s moral improvement?
Democritus tells us we ought to pray that of the phantasms appearing in
the circumambient air, such may present themselves to us as are
propitious, and that we may rather meet with those that are agreeable
to our natures and are good, than the evil and unfortunate; which is
simply introducing into philosophy a doctrine untrue in itself, and
leading to endless superstitions. My method, on the contrary, is, by
the study of history, and by the familiarity acquired in writing, to
habituate my memory to receive and retain images of the best and
worthiest characters. I thus am enabled to free myself from any
ignoble, base, or vicious impressions, contracted from the contagion of
ill company that I may be unavoidably engaged in, by the remedy of
turning my thoughts in a happy and calm temper to view these noble
examples. Of this kind are those of Timoleon the Corinthian, and Paulus
Æmilius, to write whose lives is my present business; men equally
famous, not only for their virtues, but success; insomuch that they
have left it doubtful whether they owe their greatest achievements to
good fortune, or their own prudence and conduct.

The affairs of the Syracusans, before Timoleon was sent into
Sicily, were in this posture: after Dion had driven out Dionysius the
tyrant, he was slain by treachery, and those that had assisted him in
delivering Syracuse were divided among themselves; and thus the city,
by a continual change of governors, and a train of mischiefs that
succeeded each other, became almost abandoned; while of the rest of
Sicily, part was now utterly depopulated and desolate through long
continuance of war, and most of the cities that had been left standing
were in the hands of barbarians and soldiers out of employment, that
were ready to embrace every turn of government. Such being the state of
things, Dionysius takes the opportunity, and in the tenth year of his
banishment, by the help of some mercenary troops he had got together,
forces out Nysæus, then master of Syracuse, recovers all afresh, and is
again settled in his dominion; and as at first he had been strangely
deprived of the greatest and most absolute power that ever was, by a
very small party, so now in a yet stranger manner; when in exile and of
mean condition, he became the sovereign of those who had ejected him.
All, therefore, that remained in Syracuse, had to serve under a tyrant,
who at the best was of an ungentle nature, and exasperated now to a
degree of savageness by the late misfortunes and calamities he had
suffered. The better and more distinguished citizens, having timely
retired thence to Hicetes, ruler of the Leontines, put themselves under
his protection, and chose him for their general in the war; not that he
was much preferable to any open and avowed tyrant; but they had no
other sanctuary at present, and it gave them some ground of confidence,
that he was of a Syracusan family, and had forces able to encounter
those of Dionysius.

In the meantime, the Carthaginians appeared before Sicily with
a great navy, watching when and where they might make a descent upon
the island; and terror at this fleet made the Sicilians incline to send
an embassy into Greece to demand succors from the Corinthians, whom
they confided in rather than others, not only upon the account of their
near kindred, and the great benefits they had often received by
trusting them, but because Corinth had ever shown herself attached to
freedom and averse from tyranny, and had engaged in many noble wars,
not for empire or aggrandizement, but for the sole liberty of the
Greeks. But Hicetes, who made it the business of his command not so
much to deliver the Syracusans from other tyrants, as to enslave them
to himself, had already entered into some secret conferences with those
of Carthage, while in public he commended the design of his Syracusan
clients, and dispatched ambassadors from himself, together with theirs,
into Peloponnesus; not that he really desired any relief to come from
there, but, in case the Corinthians, as was likely enough, on account
of the troubles of Greece and occupation at home, should refuse their
assistance, hoping then he should be able with less difficulty to
dispose and incline things for the Carthaginian interest, and so make
use of these foreign pretenders, as instruments and auxiliaries for
himself, either against the Syracusans or Dionysius, as occasion
served. This was discovered a while after.

The ambassadors being arrived, and their request known, the
Corinthians, who had always a great concern for all their colonies and
plantations, but especially for Syracuse, since by good fortune there
was nothing to molest them in their own country, where they were
enjoying peace and leisure at that time, readily and with one accord
passed a vote for their assistance. And when they were deliberating
about the choice of a captain for the expedition, and the magistrates
were urging the claims of various aspirants for reputation, one of the
crowd stood up and named Timoleon, son of Timodemus, who had long
absented himself from public business, and had neither any thoughts of,
nor the least pretension to, an employment of that nature. Some god or
other, it might rather seem, had put it in the man’s heart to mention
him; such favor and good-will on the part of Fortune seemed at once to
be shown in his election, and to accompany all his following actions,
as though it were on purpose to commend his worth, and add grace and
ornament to his personal virtues. As regards his parentage, both
Timodemus his father, and his mother Demariste, were of high rank in
the city; and as for himself, he was noted for his love of his country,
and his gentleness of temper, except in his extreme hatred to tyrants
and wicked men. His natural abilities for war were so happily tempered,
that while a rare prudence might be seen in all the enterprises of his
younger years, an equal courage showed itself in the last exploits of
his declining age. He had an elder brother, whose name was Timophanes,
who was every way unlike him, being indiscreet and rash, and infected
by the suggestions of some friends and foreign soldiers, whom he kept
always about him, with a passion for absolute power. He seemed to have
a certain force and vehemence in all military service, and even to
delight in dangers, and thus he took much with the people, and was
advanced to the highest charges, as a vigorous and effective warrior;
in the obtaining of which offices and promotions, Timoleon much
assisted him, helping to conceal or at least to extenuate his errors,
embellishing by his praise whatever was commendable in him, and setting
off his good qualities to the best advantage.

It happened once in the battle fought by the Corinthians
against the forces of Argos and Cleonæ, that Timoleon served among the
infantry, when Timophanes, commanding their cavalry, was brought into
extreme danger; as his horse being wounded fell forward, and threw him
headlong amidst the enemies, while part of his companions dispersed at
once in a panic, and the small number that remained, bearing up against
a great multitude, had much ado to maintain any resistance. As soon,
therefore, as Timoleon was aware of the accident, he ran hastily in to
his brother’s rescue, and covering the fallen Timophanes with his
buckler, after having received abundance of darts, and several strokes
by the sword upon his body and his armor, he at length with much
difficulty obliged the enemies to retire, and brought off his brother
alive and safe. But when the Corinthians, for fear of losing their city
a second time, as they had once before, by admitting their allies, made
a decree to maintain four hundred mercenaries for its security, and
gave Timophanes the command over them, he, abandoning all regard to
honor and equity, at once proceeded to put into execution his plans for
making himself absolute, and bringing the place under his own power;
and having cut off many principal citizens, uncondemned and without
trial, who were most likely to hinder his design, he declared himself
tyrant of Corinth; a procedure that infinitely afflicted Timoleon, to
whom the wickedness of such a brother appeared to be his own reproach
and calamity. He undertook to persuade him by reasoning, that,
desisting from that wild and unhappy ambition, he would bethink himself
how he should make the Corinthians some amends, and find out an
expedient to remedy and correct the evils he had done them. When his
single admonition was rejected and contemned by him, he makes a second
attempt, taking with him Æschylus his kinsman, brother to the wife of
Timophanes, and a certain diviner, that was his friend, whom Theopompus
in his history calls Satyrus, but Ephorus and Timæus mention in theirs
by the name of Orthagoras. After a few days, then, he returns to his
brother with this company, all three of them surrounding and earnestly
importuning him upon the same subject, that now at length he would
listen to reason, and be of another mind. But when Timophanes began
first to laugh at the men’s simplicity, and presently broke out into
rage and indignation against them, Timoleon stepped aside from him and
stood weeping with his face covered, while the other two, drawing out
their swords, dispatched him in a moment.

On the rumor of this act being soon scattered about, the better
and more generous of the Corinthians highly applauded Timoleon for the
hatred of wrong and the greatness of soul that had made him, though of
a gentle disposition and full of love and kindness for his family,
think the obligations to his country stronger than the ties of
consanguinity, and prefer that which is good and just before gain and
interest and his own particular advantage. For the same brother, who
with so much bravery had been saved by him when he fought valiantly in
the cause of Corinth, he had now as nobly sacrificed for enslaving her
afterward by a base and treacherous usurpation. But then, on the other
side, those that knew not how to live in a democracy, and had been used
to make their humble court to the men of power, though they openly
professed to rejoice at the death of the tyrant, nevertheless, secretly
reviling Timoleon, as one that had committed an impious and abominable
act, drove him into melancholy and dejection. And when he came to
understand how heavily his mother took it, and that she likewise
uttered the saddest complaints and most terrible imprecations against
him, he went to satisfy and comfort her as to what had happened; and
finding that she would not endure so much as to look upon him, but
caused her doors to be shut, that he might have no admission into her
presence, with grief at this he grew so disordered in his mind and so
disconsolate, that he determined to put an end to his perplexity with
his life, by abstaining from all manner of sustenance. But through the
care and diligence of his friends, who were very instant with him, and
added force to their entreaties, he came to resolve and promise at
last, that he would endure living, provided it might be in solitude,
and remote from company; so that, quitting all civil transactions and
commerce with the world, for a long while after his first retirement he
never came into Corinth, but wandered up and down the fields, full of
anxious and tormenting thoughts, and spent his time in desert places,
at the farthest distance from society and human intercourse. So true it
is that the minds of men are easily shaken and carried off from their
own sentiments through the casual commendation or reproof of others,
unless the judgments that we make, and the purposes we conceive, be
confirmed by reason and philosophy, and thus obtain strength and
steadiness. An action must not only be just and laudable in its own
nature, but it must proceed likewise from solid motives and a lasting
principle, that so we may fully and constantly approve the thing, and
be perfectly satisfied in what we do; for otherwise, after having put
our resolution into practice, we shall out of pure weakness come to be
troubled at the performance, when the grace and goodliness, which
rendered it before so amiable and pleasing to us, begin to decay and
wear out of our fancy; like greedy people, who, seizing on the more
delicious morsels of any dish with a keen appetite, are presently
disgusted when they grow full, and find themselves oppressed and uneasy
now by what they before so greedily desired. For a succeeding dislike
spoils the best of actions, and repentance makes that which was never
so well done, become base and faulty; whereas the choice that is
founded upon knowledge and wise reasoning, does not change by
disappointment, or suffer us to repent, though it happen perchance to
be less prosperous in the issue. And thus Phocion, of Athens, having
always vigorously opposed the measures of Leosthenes, when success
appeared to attend them, and he saw his countrymen rejoicing and
offering sacrifice in honor of their victory, “I should have been as
glad,” said he to them, “that I myself had been the author of what
Leosthenes has achieved for you, as I am that I gave you my own counsel
against it.” A more vehement reply is recorded to have been made by
Aristides the Locrian, one of Plato’s companions, to Dionysius the
elder, who demanded one of his daughters in marriage: “I had rather,”
said he to him, “see the virgin in her grave, than in the palace of a
tyrant.” And when Dionysius, enraged at the affront, made his sons be
put to death a while after, and then again insultingly asked, whether
he were still in the same mind as to the disposal of his daughters, his
answer was, “I cannot but grieve at the cruelty of your deeds, but am
not sorry for the freedom of my own words.” Such expressions as these
may belong perhaps to a more sublime and accomplished virtue.

The grief, however, of Timoleon at what had been done, whether
it arose from commiseration of his brother’s fate, or the reverence he
bore his mother, so shattered and broke his spirits, that for the space
of almost twenty years, he had not offered to concern himself in any
honorable or public action. When, therefore, he was pitched upon for a
general, and joyfully accepted as such by the suffrages of the people,
Teleclides, who was at that time the most powerful and distinguished
man in Corinth, began to exhort him that he would act now like a man of
worth and gallantry: “For,” said he, “if you do bravely in this
service, we shall believe that you delivered us from a tyrant; but if
otherwise, that you killed your brother.” While he was yet preparing to
set sail, and enlisting soldiers to embark with him, there came letters
to the Corinthians from Hicetes, plainly disclosing his revolt and
treachery. For his ambassadors were no sooner gone for Corinth, but he
openly joined the Carthaginians, negotiating that they might assist him
to throw out Dionysius, and become master of Syracuse in his room. And
fearing he might be disappointed of his aim, if troops and a commander
should come from Corinth before this were effected, he sent a letter of
advice thither, in all haste, to prevent their setting out, telling
them they need not be at any cost and trouble upon his account, or run
the hazard of a Sicilian voyage, especially since the Carthaginians,
alliance with whom against Dionysius the slowness of their motions had
compelled him to embrace, would dispute their passage, and lay in wait
to attack them with a numerous fleet. This letter being publicly read,
if any had been cold and indifferent before as to the expedition in
hand, the indignation they now conceived against Hicetes so exasperated
and inflamed them all, that they willingly contributed to supply
Timoleon, and endeavored, with one accord, to hasten his departure.

When the vessels were equipped, and his soldiers every way
provided for, the female priests of Proserpina had a dream or vision,
wherein she and her mother Ceres appeared to them in a traveling garb,
and were heard to say that they were going to sail with Timoleon into
Sicily; whereupon the Corinthians, having built a sacred galley,
devoted it to them, and called it the galley of the goddesses. Timoleon
went in person to Delphi, where he sacrificed to Apollo, and,
descending into the place of prophecy, was surprised with the following
marvelous occurrence. A riband with crowns and figures of victory
embroidered upon it, slipped off from among the gifts that were there
consecrated and hung up in the temple, and fell directly down upon his
head; so that Apollo seemed already to crown him with success, and send
him thence to conquer and triumph. He put to sea only with seven ships
of Corinth, two of Corcyra, and a tenth which was furnished by the
Leucadians; and when he was now entered into the deep by night, and
carried with a prosperous gale, the heaven seemed all on a sudden to
break open, and a bright spreading flame to issue forth from it, and
hover over the ship he was in; and, having formed itself into a torch,
not unlike those that are used in the mysteries, it began to steer the
same course, and run along in their company, guiding them by its light
to that quarter of Italy where they designed to go ashore. The
soothsayers affirmed, that this apparition agreed with the dream of the
holy women, since the goddesses were now visibly joining in the
expedition, and sending this light from heaven before them: Sicily
being thought sacred to Proserpina, as poets feign that the rape was
committed there, and that the island was given her in dowry when she
married Pluto.

These early demonstrations of divine favor greatly encouraged
his whole army; so that, making all the speed they were able, by a
voyage across the open sea, they were soon passing along the coast of
Italy. But the tidings that came from Sicily much perplexed Timoleon,
and disheartened his soldiers. For Hicetes, having already beaten
Dionysius out of the field, and reduced most of the quarters of
Syracuse itself, now hemmed him in and besieged him in the citadel and
what is called the Island, whither he was fled for his last refuge;
while the Carthaginians, by agreement, were to make it their business
to hinder Timoleon from landing in any port of Sicily; so that he and
his party being driven back, they might with ease and at their own
leisure divide the island among themselves. In pursuance of which
design, the Carthaginians sent away twenty of their galleys to Rhegium,
having aboard them certain ambassadors from Hicetes to Timoleon, who
carried instructions suitable to these proceedings, specious amusements
and plausible stories, to color and conceal dishonest purposes. They
had order to propose and demand that Timoleon himself, if he liked the
offer, should come to advise with Hicetes, and partake of all his
conquests, but that he might send back his ships and forces to Corinth,
since the war was in a manner finished, and the Carthaginians had
blocked up the passage, determined to oppose them if they should try to
force their way towards the shore. When, therefore, the Corinthians met
with these envoys at Rhegium, and received their message, and saw the
Phœnician vessels riding at anchor in the bay, they became keenly
sensible of the abuse that was put upon them, and felt a general
indignation against Hicetes, and great apprehensions for the Siceliots,
whom they now plainly perceived to be as it were a prize and recompense
to Hicetes on one side for his perfidy, and to the Carthaginians on the
other for the sovereign power they secured to him. For it seemed
utterly impossible to force and overbear the Carthaginian ships that
lay before them and were double their number, as also to vanquish the
victorious troops which Hicetes had with him in Syracuse, to take the
lead of which very troops they had undertaken their voyage.

The case being thus, Timoleon, after some conference with the
envoys of Hicetes and the Carthaginian captains, told them he should
readily submit to their proposals (to what purpose would it be to
refuse compliance?): he was desirous only, before his return to
Corinth, that what had passed between them in private might be solemnly
declared before the people of Rhegium, a Greek city, and a common
friend to the parties; this, he said, would very much conduce to his
own security and discharge; and they likewise would more strictly
observe articles of agreement, on behalf of the Syracusans, which they
had obliged themselves to in the presence of so many witnesses. The
design of all which was, only to divert their attention, while he got
an opportunity of slipping away from their fleet: a contrivance that
all the principal Rhegians were privy and assisting to, who had a great
desire that the affairs of Sicily should fall into Corinthian hands,
and dreaded the consequences of having barbarian neighbors. An assembly
was therefore called, and the gates shut, that the citizens might have
no liberty to turn to other business; and a succession of speakers came
forward, addressing the people at great length, to the same effect,
without bringing the subject to any conclusion, making way each for
another and purposely spinning out the time, till the Corinthian
galleys should get clear of the haven; the Carthaginian commanders
being detained there without any suspicion, as also Timoleon still
remained present, and gave signs as if he were just preparing to make
an oration. But upon secret notice that the rest of the galleys were
already gone on, and that his alone remained waiting for him, by the
help and concealment of those Rhegians that were about the hustings and
favored his departure, he made shift to slip away through the crowd,
and, running down to the port, set sail with all speed; and having
reached his other vessels, they came all safe to Tauromenium in Sicily,
whither they had been formerly invited, and where they were now kindly
received by Andromachus, then ruler of the city. This man was father of
Timæus the historian, and incomparably the best of all those that bore
sway in Sicily at that time, governing his citizens according to law
and justice, and openly professing an aversion and enmity to all
tyrants; upon which account he gave Timoleon leave to muster up his
troops there, and to make that city the seat of war, persuading the
inhabitants to join their arms with the Corinthian forces, and assist
them in the design of delivering Sicily.

But the Carthaginians who were left in Rhegium perceiving, when
the assembly was dissolved, that Timoleon had given them the go by,
were not a little vexed to see themselves outwitted, much to the
amusement of the Rhegians, who could not but smile to find Phœnicians
complain of being cheated. However, they dispatched a messenger aboard
one of their galleys to Tauromenium, who, after much blustering in the
insolent barbaric way, and many menaces to Andromachus if he did not
forthwith send the Corinthians off, stretched out his hand with the
inside upward, and then turning it down again, threatened he would
handle their city even so, and turn it topsy-turvy in as little time,
and with as much ease. Andromachus, laughing at the man’s confidence,
made no other reply, but, imitating his gesture, bid him hasten his own
departure, unless he had a mind to see that kind of dexterity practiced
first upon the galley which brought him thither.

Hicetes, informed that Timoleon had made good his passage, was
in great fear of what might follow, and sent to desire the
Carthaginians that a large number of galleys might be ordered to attend
and secure the coast. And now it was that the Syracusans began wholly
to despair of safety, seeing the Carthaginians possessed of their
haven, Hicetes master of the town, and Dionysius supreme in the
citadel; while Timoleon had as yet but a slender hold of Sicily, as it
were by the fringe or border of it, in the small city of the
Tauromenians, with a feeble hope and a poor company; having but a
thousand soldiers at the most, and no more provisions, either of corn
or money, than were just necessary for the maintenance and the pay of
that inconsiderable number. Nor did the other towns of Sicily confide
in him, overpowered as they were with violence and outrage, and
embittered against all that should offer to lead armies, by the
treacherous conduct chiefly of Callippus, an Athenian, and Pharax, a
Lacedæmonian captain, both of whom, after giving out that the design of
their coming was to introduce liberty and depose tyrants, so tyrannized
themselves, that the reign of former oppressors seemed to be a golden
age in comparison, and the Sicilians began to consider those more happy
who had expired in servitude, than any that had lived to see such a
dismal freedom.

Looking, therefore, for no better usage from the Corinthian
general, but imagining that it was only the same old course of things
once more, specious presences and false professions to allure them by
fair hopes and kind promises into the obedience of a new master, they
all, with one accord, unless it were the people of Adranum, suspected
the exhortations, and rejected the overtures that were made them in his
name. These were inhabitants of a small city, consecrated to Adranus, a
certain god that was in high veneration throughout Sicily, and, as it
happened, they were then at variance among themselves, insomuch that
one party called in Hicetes and the Carthaginians to assist them, while
the other sent proposals to Timoleon. It so fell out that these
auxiliaries, striving which should be soonest, both arrived at Adranum
about the same time; Hicetes bringing with him at least five thousand
fighting men, while all the force Timoleon could make did not exceed
twelve hundred. With these he marched out of Tauromenium, which was
about three hundred and forty furlongs distant from that city. The
first day he moved but slowly, and took up his quarters betimes after a
short journey; but the day following he quickened his pace, and, having
passed through much difficult ground, towards evening received advice
that Hicetes was just approaching Adranum, and pitching his camp before
it; upon which intelligence, his captains and other officers caused the
vanguard to halt, that the army being refreshed, and having reposed a
while, might engage the enemy with better heart. But Timoleon, coming
up in haste, desired them not to stop for that reason, but rather use
all possible diligence to surprise the enemy, whom probably they would
now find in disorder, as having lately ended their march, and being
taken up at present in erecting tents and preparing supper; which he
had no sooner said, but laying hold of his buckler and putting himself
in the front, he led them on as it were to certain victory. The
braveness of such a leader made them all follow him with like courage
and assurance. They were now within less than thirty furlongs of
Adranum, which they quickly traversed, and immediately fell in upon the
enemy, who were seized with confusion, and began to retire at their
first approaches; one consequence of which was that amidst so little
opposition, and so early and general a flight, there were not many more
than three hundred slain, and about twice the number made prisoners.
Their camp and baggage, however, was all taken. The fortune of this
onset soon induced the Adranitans to unlock their gates, and embrace
the interest of Timoleon, to whom they recounted, with a mixture of
affright and admiration, how, at the very minute of the encounter, the
doors of their temple flew open of their own accord, that the javelin
also, which their god held in his hand, was observed to tremble at the
point, and that drops of sweat had been seen running down his face:
prodigies that not only presaged the victory then obtained, but were an
omen, it seems, of all his future exploits, to which this first happy
action gave the occasion.

For now the neighboring cities and potentates sent deputies,
one upon another, to seek his friendship and make offer of their
service. Among the rest, Mamercus, the tyrant of Catana, an experienced
warrior and a wealthy prince, made proposals of alliance with him, and,
what was of greater importance still, Dionysius himself being now grown
desperate, and wellnigh forced to surrender, despising Hicetes who had
been thus shamefully baffled, and admiring the valor of Timoleon, found
means to advertise him and his Corinthians that he should be content to
deliver up himself and the citadel into their hands. Timoleon, gladly
embracing this unlooked for advantage, sends away Euclides and
Telemachus, two Corinthian captains, with four hundred men, for the
seizure and custody of the castle, with directions to enter not all at
once, or in open view, that being impracticable so long as the enemy
kept guard, but by stealth, and in small companies. And so they took
possession of the fortress, and the palace of Dionysius, with all the
stores and ammunition he had prepared and laid up to maintain the war.
They found a good number of horses, every variety of engines, a
multitude of darts, and weapons to arm seventy thousand men (a magazine
that had been formed from ancient time), besides two thousand soldiers
that were then with him, whom he gave up with the rest for Timoleon’s
service. Dionysius himself, putting his treasure aboard, and taking a
few friends, sailed away unobserved by Hicetes, and being brought to
the camp of Timoleon, there first appeared in the humble dress of a
private person, and was shortly after sent to Corinth with a single
ship and a small sum of money. Born and educated in the most splendid
court and the most absolute monarchy that ever was, which he held and
kept up for the space of ten years succeeding his father’s death, he
had, after Dion’s expedition, spent twelve other years in a continual
agitation of wars and contests, and great variety of fortune, during
which time all the mischiefs he had committed in his former reign were
more than repaid by the ills he himself then suffered; since he lived
to see the deaths of his sons in the prime and vigor of their age, and
the rape of his daughters in the flower of their virginity, and the
wicked abuse of his sister and his wife, who, after being first exposed
to all the lawless insults of the soldiery, was then murdered with her
children, and cast into the sea; the particulars of which are more
exactly given in the life of Dion.

Upon the news of his landing at Corinth, there was hardly a man in
Greece who had not the curiosity to come and view the late formidable
tyrant, and say some words to him; part, rejoicing at his disasters,
were led thither out of mere spite and hatred, that they might have the
pleasure of trampling, as it were, on the ruins of his broken fortune;
but others, letting their attention and their sympathy turn rather to
the changes and revolutions of his life, could not but see in them a
proof of the strength and potency with which divine and unseen causes
operate amidst the weakness of human and visible things. For neither
art nor nature did in that age produce anything comparable to this work
and wonder of fortune, which showed the very same man, that was not
long before supreme monarch of Sicily, loitering about perhaps in the
fish-market, or sitting in a perfumer’s shop, drinking the diluted wine
of taverns, or squabbling in the street with common women, or
pretending to instruct the singing women of the theater, and seriously
disputing with them about the measure and harmony of pieces of music
that were performed there. Such behavior on his part was variously
criticized. He was thought by many to act thus out of pure compliance
with his own natural indolent and vicious inclinations; while finer
judges were of opinion, that in all this he was playing a politic part,
with a design to be contemned among them, and that the Corinthians
might not feel any apprehension or suspicion of his being uneasy under
his reverse of fortune, or solicitous to retrieve it; to avoid which
dangers, he purposely and against his true nature affected an
appearance of folly and want of spirit in his private life and
amusements.

However it be, there are sayings and repartees of his left
still upon record, which seem to show that he not ignobly accommodated
himself to his present circumstances; as may appear in part from the
ingenuousness of the avowal he made on coming to Leucadia, which, as
well as Syracuse, was a Corinthian colony, where he told the
inhabitants, that he found himself not unlike boys who have been in
fault, who can talk cheerfully with their brothers, but are ashamed to
see their father; so, likewise, he, he said, could gladly reside with
them in that island, whereas he felt a certain awe upon his mind, which
made him averse to the sight of Corinth, that was a common mother to
them both. The thing is further evident from the reply he once made to
a stranger in Corinth, who deriding him in a rude and scornful manner
about the conferences he used to have with philosophers, whose company
had been one of his pleasures while yet a monarch, and demanding, in
fine, what he was the better now for all those wise and learned
discourses of Plato, “Do you think,” said he, “I have made no profit of
his philosophy, when you see me bear my change of fortune as I do?” And
when Aristoxenus the musician, and several others, desired to know how
Plato offended him, and what had been the ground of his displeasure
with him, he made answer, that, of the many evils attaching to the
condition of sovereignty, the one greatest infelicity was that none of
those who were accounted friends would venture to speak freely, or tell
the plain truth; and that by means of such he had been deprived of
Plato’s kindness. At another time, when one of those pleasant
companions that are desirous to pass for wits, in mockery to Dionysius,
as if he were still the tyrant, shook out the folds of his cloak, as he
was entering into the room where he was, to show there were no
concealed weapons about him, Dionysius, by way of retort, observed,
that he would prefer he would do so on leaving the room, as a security
that he was carrying nothing off with him. And when Philip of Macedon,
at a drinking party, began to speak in banter about the verses and
tragedies which his father, Dionysius the elder, had left behind him,
and pretended to wonder how he could get any time from his other
business to compose such elaborate and ingenious pieces, he replied,
very much to the purpose, “It was at those leisurable hours, which such
as you and I, and those we call happy men, bestow upon our cups.” Plato
had not the opportunity to see Dionysius at Corinth, being already dead
before he came thither; but Diogenes of Sinope, at their first meeting
in the street there, saluted him with the ambiguous expression, “O
Dionysius, how little you deserve your present life!” Upon which
Dionysius stopped and replied, “I thank you, Diogenes, for your
condolence.” “Condole with you!” replied Diogenes; “do you not suppose
that, on the contrary, I am indignant that such a slave as you, who, if
you had your due, should have been let alone to grow old, and die in
the state of tyranny, as your father did before you, should now enjoy
the ease of private persons, and be here to sport and frolic it in our
society?” So that when I compare those sad stories of Philistus,
touching the daughters of Leptines, where he makes pitiful moan on
their behalf, as fallen from all the blessings and advantages of
powerful greatness to the miseries of a humble life, they seem to me
like the lamentations of a woman who has lost her box of ointment, her
purple dresses, and her golden trinkets. Such anecdotes will not, I
conceive, be thought either foreign to my purpose of writing Lives, or
unprofitable in themselves, by such readers as are not in too much
haste, or busied and taken up with other concerns.

But if the misfortune of Dionysius appear strange and
extraordinary, we shall have no less reason to wonder at the good
fortune of Timoleon, who, within fifty days after his landing in
Sicily, both recovered the citadel of Syracuse, and sent Dionysius an
exile into Peloponnesus. This lucky beginning so animated the
Corinthians, that they ordered him a supply of two thousand foot and
two hundred horse, who, reaching Thurii, intended to cross over thence
into Sicily; but finding the whole sea beset with Carthaginian ships,
which made their passage impracticable, they were constrained to stop
there, and watch their opportunity: which time, however, was employed
in a noble action. For the Thurians, going out to war against their
Bruttian enemies, left their city in charge with these Corinthian
strangers, who defended it as carefully as if it had been their own
country, and faithfully resigned it up again.

Hicetes, in the interim, continued still to besiege the castle
of Syracuse, and hindered all provisions from coming in by sea to
relieve the Corinthians that were in it. He had engaged also, and
dispatched towards Adranum, two unknown foreigners to assassinate
Timoleon, who at no time kept any standing guard about his person, and
was then altogether secure, diverting himself, without any
apprehension, among the citizens of the place, it being a festival in
honor of their gods. The two men that were sent, having casually heard
that Timoleon was about to sacrifice, came directly into the temple
with poniards under their cloaks, and pressing in among the crowd, by
little and little got up close to the altar; but, as they were just
looking for a sign from each other to begin the attempt, a third person
struck one of them over the head with a sword, upon whose sudden fall,
neither he that gave the blow, nor the partisan of him that received
it, kept their stations any longer; but the one, making way with his
bloody sword, put no stop to his flight, till he gained the top of a
certain lofty precipice, while the other, laying hold of the altar,
besought Timoleon to spare his life, and he would reveal to him the
whole conspiracy. His pardon being granted, he confessed that both
himself and his dead companion were sent thither purposely to slay him.
While this discovery was made, he that killed the other conspirator had
been fetched down from his sanctuary of the rock, loudly and often
protesting, as he came along, that there was no injustice in the fact,
as he had only taken righteous vengeance for his father’s blood, whom
this man had murdered before in the city of Leontini; the truth of
which was attested by several there present, who could not choose but
wonder too at the strange dexterity of fortune’s operations, the
facility with which she makes one event the spring and motion to
something wholly different, uniting every scattered accident and lose
particular and remote action, and interweaving them together to serve
her purposes; so that things that in themselves seem to have no
connection or interdependence whatsoever, become in her hands, so to
say, the end and the beginning of each other. The Corinthians,
satisfied as to the innocence of this seasonable feat, honored and
rewarded the author with a present of ten pounds in their money, since
he had, as it were, lent the use of his just resentment to the tutelar
genius that seemed to be protecting Timoleon, and had not preexpended
this anger, so long ago conceived, but had reserved and deferred, under
fortune’s guidance, for his preservation, the revenge of a private
quarrel.

But this fortunate escape had effects and consequences beyond
the present, as it inspired the highest hopes and future expectations
of Timoleon, making people reverence and protect him as a sacred person
sent by heaven to avenge and redeem Sicily. Hicetes, having missed his
aim in this enterprise, and perceiving, also, that many went off and
sided with Timoleon, began to chide himself for his foolish modesty,
that, when so considerable a force of the Carthaginians lay ready to be
commanded by him, he had employed them hitherto by degrees and in small
numbers, introducing their reinforcements by stealth and clandestinely,
as if he had been ashamed of the action. Therefore, now laying aside
his former nicety, he calls in Mago, their admiral, with his whole
navy, who presently set sail, and seized upon the port with a
formidable fleet of at least a hundred and fifty vessels, landing there
sixty thousand foot which were all lodged within the city of Syracuse;
so that, in all men’s opinion, the time anciently talked of and long
expected, wherein Sicily should be subjugated by barbarians, was now
come to its fatal period. For in all their preceding wars and many
desperate conflicts with Sicily, the Carthaginians had never been able,
before this, to take Syracuse; whereas Hicetes now receiving them, and
putting the city into their hands, you might see it become now as it
were a camp of barbarians. By this means, the Corinthian soldiers that
kept the castle found themselves brought into great danger and
hardship; as, besides that their provision grew scarce, and they began
to be in want, because the havens were strictly guarded and blocked up,
the enemy exercised them still with skirmishes and combats about their
walls, and they were not only obliged to be continually in arms, but to
divide and prepare themselves for assaults and encounters of every
kind, and to repel every variety of the means of offense employed by a
besieging army.

Timoleon made shift to relieve them in these straits, sending
corn from Catana by small fishing-boats and little skiffs, which
commonly gained a passage through the Carthaginian galleys in times of
storm, stealing up when the blockading ships were driven apart and
dispersed by the stress of weather; which Mago and Hicetes observing,
they agreed to fall upon Catana, from whence these supplies were
brought in to the besieged, and accordingly put off from Syracuse,
taking with them the best soldiers in their whole army. Upon this, Neon
the Corinthian, who was captain of those that kept the citadel, taking
notice that the enemies who stayed there behind were very negligent and
careless in keeping guard, made a sudden sally upon them as they lay
scattered, and, killing some and putting others to flight, he took and
possessed himself of that quarter which they call Acradina, and was
thought to be the strongest and most impregnable part of Syracuse, a
city made up and compacted as it were, of several towns put together.
Having thus stored himself with corn and money, he did not abandon the
place, nor retire again into the castle, but fortifying the precincts
of Acradina, and joining it by works to the citadel, he undertook the
defense of both. Mago and Hicetes were now come near to Catana, when a
horseman, dispatched from Syracuse, brought them tidings that Acradina
was taken; upon which they returned, in all haste, with great disorder
and confusion, having neither been able to reduce the city they went
against, nor to preserve that they were masters of.

These successes, indeed, were such as might leave foresight and
courage a pretence still of disputing it with fortune, which
contributed most to the result. But the next following event can
scarcely be ascribed to anything but pure felicity. The Corinthian
soldiers who stayed at Thurii, partly for fear of the Carthaginian
galleys which lay in wait for them under the command of Hanno, and
partly because of tempestuous weather which had lasted for many days,
and rendered the sea dangerous, took a resolution to march by land over
the Bruttian territories, and, what with persuasion and force together,
made good their passage through those barbarians to the city of
Rhegium, the sea being still rough and raging as before. But Hanno, not
expecting the Corinthians would venture out, and supposing it would be
useless to wait there any longer, bethought himself, as he imagined, of
a most ingenious and clever stratagem apt to delude and ensnare the
enemy; in pursuance of which he commanded the seamen to crown
themselves with garlands, and, adorning his galleys with bucklers both
of the Greek and Carthaginian make, he sailed away for Syracuse in this
triumphant equipage, and using all his oars as he passed under the
castle with much shouting and laughter, cried out, on purpose to
dishearten the besieged, that he was come from vanquishing and taking
the Corinthian succors, which he fell upon at sea as they were passing
over into Sicily. While he was thus biding and playing his tricks
before Syracuse, the Corinthians, now come as far as Rhegium, observing
the coast clear, and that the wind was laid as it were by miracle, to
afford them in all appearance a quiet and smooth passage, went
immediately aboard on such little barks and fishing-boats as were then
at hand, and got over to Sicily with such complete safety and in such
an extraordinary calm, that they drew their horses by the reins,
swimming along by them as the vessels went across.

When they were all landed, Timoleon came to receive them, and
by their means at once obtained possession of Messena, from whence he
marched in good order to Syracuse, trusting more to his late prosperous
achievements than his present strength, as the whole army he had then
with him did not exceed the number of four thousand; Mago, however, was
troubled and fearful at the first notice of his coming, and grew more
apprehensive and jealous still upon the following occasion. The marshes
about Syracuse, that receive a great deal of fresh water, as well from
springs as from lakes and rivers discharging themselves into the sea,
breed abundance of eels, which may be always taken there in great
quantities by any that will fish for them. The mercenary soldiers that
served on both sides, were wont to follow the sport together at their
vacant hours, and upon any cessation of arms, who being all Greeks, and
having no cause of private enmity to each other, as they would venture
bravely in fight, so in times of truce used to meet and converse
amicably together. And at this present time, while engaged about this
common business of fishing, they fell into talk together; and some
expressing their admiration of the neighboring sea, and others telling
how much they were taken with the convenience and commodiousness of the
buildings and public works, one of the Corinthian party took occasion
to demand of the others: “And is it possible that you who are Grecians
born, should be so forward to reduce a city of this greatness, and
enjoying so many rare advantages, into the state of barbarism; and lend
your assistance to plant Carthaginians, that are the worst and
bloodiest of men, so much the nearer to us? whereas you should rather
wish there were many more Sicilies to lie between them and Greece. Have
you so little sense as to believe, that they come hither with an army,
from the Pillars of Hercules and the Atlantic Sea, to hazard themselves
for the establishment of Hicetes? who, if he had had the consideration
which becomes a general, would never have thrown out his ancestors and
founders to bring in the enemies of his country in the room of them,
when he might have enjoyed all suitable honor and command, with consent
of Timoleon and the rest of Corinth.” The Greeks that were in pay with
Hicetes, noising these discourses about their camp, gave Mago some
ground to suspect, as indeed he had long sought for a pretence to be
gone, that there was treachery contrived against him; so that, although
Hicetes entreated him to tarry, and made it appear how much stronger
they were than the enemy, yet, conceiving they came far more short of
Timoleon in respect of courage and fortune, than they surpassed him in
number, he presently went aboard, and set sail for Africa, letting
Sicily escape out of his hands with dishonor to himself, and for such
uncertain causes, that no human reason could give an account of his
departure.

The day after he went away, Timoleon came up before the city,
in array for a battle. But when he and his company heard of this sudden
flight, and saw the docks all empty, they could not forbear laughing at
the cowardice of Mago, and in mockery caused proclamation to be made
through the city, that a reward would be given to any one who could
bring them tidings whither the Carthaginian fleet had conveyed itself
from them. However, Hicetes resolving to fight it out alone, and not
quitting his hold of the city, but sticking close to the quarters he
was in possession of, places that were well fortified and not easy to
be attacked, Timoleon divided his forces into three parts, and fell
himself upon the side where the river Anapus ran, which was most strong
and difficult of access; and he commanded those that were led by Isias,
a Corinthian captain, to make their assault from the post of Acradina,
while Dinarchus and Demaretus, that brought him the last supply from
Corinth, were, with a third division, to attempt the quarter called
Epipolæ. A considerable impression being made from every side at once,
the soldiers of Hicetes were beaten off and put to flight; and
this,—that the city came to be taken by storm, and fall suddenly into
their hands, upon the defeat and rout of the enemy,—we must in all
justice ascribe to the valor of the assailants, and the wise conduct of
their general; but that not so much as a man of the Corinthians was
either slain or wounded in the action, this the good fortune of
Timoleon seems to challenge for her own work, as though, in a sort of
rivalry with his own personal exertions, she made it her aim to exceed
and obscure his actions by her favors, that those who heard him
commended for his noble deeds might rather admire the happiness, than
the merit of them. For the fame of what was done not only passed
through all Sicily, and filled Italy with wonder, but even Greece
itself, after a few days, came to ring with the greatness of his
exploit; insomuch that those of Corinth, who had as yet no certainty
that their auxiliaries were landed on the island, had tidings brought
them at the same time that they were safe and were conquerors. In so
prosperous a course did affairs run, and such was the speed and
celerity of execution with which fortune, as with a new ornament, set
off the native lustres of the performance.

Timoleon, being master of the citadel, avoided the error which
Dion had been guilty of. He spared not the place for the beauty and
sumptuousness of its fabric, and, keeping clear of those suspicions
which occasioned first the unpopularity and afterwards the fall of
Dion, made a public crier give notice, that all the Syracusans who were
willing to have a hand in the work, should bring pick-axes and
mattocks, and other instruments, and help him to demolish the
fortifications of the tyrants. When they all came up with one accord,
looking upon that order and that day as the surest foundation of their
liberty, they not only pulled down the castle, but overturned the
palaces and monuments adjoining, and whatever else might preserve any
memory of former tyrants. Having soon leveled and cleared the place, he
there presently erected courts for administration of justice,
gratifying the citizens by this means, and building popular government
on the fall and ruin of tyranny. But since he had recovered a city
destitute of inhabitants, some of them dead in civil wars and
insurrections, and others being fled to escape tyrants, so that through
solitude and want of people the great marketplace of Syracuse was
overgrown with such quantity of rank herbage that it became a pasture
for their horses, the grooms lying along in the grass as they fed by
them; while also other towns, very few excepted, were become full of
stags and wild boars, so that those who had nothing else to do went
frequently a hunting, and found game in the suburbs and about the
walls; and not one of those who had possessed themselves of castles, or
made garrisons in the country, could be persuaded to quit their present
abode, or would accept an invitation to return back into the city, so
much did they all dread and abhor the very name of assemblies and forms
of government and public speaking, that had produced the greater part
of those usurpers who had successively assumed a dominion over
them,—Timoleon, therefore, with the Syracusans that remained,
considering this vast desolation, and how little hope there was to have
it otherwise supplied, thought good to write to the Corinthians,
requesting that they would send a colony out of Greece to repeople
Syracuse. For else the land about it would lie unimproved; and besides
this, they expected to be involved in a greater war from Africa, having
news brought them that Mago had killed himself, and that the
Carthaginians, out of rage for his ill conduct in the late expedition,
had caused his body to be nailed upon a cross, and that they were
raising a mighty force, with design to make their descent upon Sicily
the next summer.

These letters from Timoleon being delivered at Corinth, and the
ambassadors of Syracuse beseeching them at the same time, that they
would take upon them the care of their poor city, and once again become
the founders of it, the Corinthians were not tempted by any feeling of
cupidity to lay hold of the advantage. Nor did they seize and
appropriate the city to themselves, but going about first to the games
that are kept as sacred in Greece, and to the most numerously attended
religious assemblages, they made publication by heralds, that the
Corinthians, having destroyed the usurpation at Syracuse and driven out
the tyrant, did thereby invite the Syracusan exiles, and any other
Siceliots, to return and inhabit the city, with full enjoyment of
freedom under their own laws, the land being divided among them in just
and equal proportions. And after this, sending messengers into Asia and
the several islands where they understood that most of the scattered
fugitives were then residing, they bade them all repair to Corinth,
engaging that the Corinthians would afford them vessels and commanders,
and a safe convoy, at their own charges, to Syracuse. Such generous
proposals, being thus spread about, gained them the just and honorable
recompense of general praise and benediction, for delivering the
country from oppressors, and saving it from barbarians, and restoring
it at length to the rightful owners of the place. These, when they were
assembled at Corinth, and found how insufficient their company was,
besought the Corinthians that they might have a supplement of other
persons, as well out of their city as the rest of Greece, to go with
them as joint-colonists; and so raising themselves to the number of ten
thousand, they sailed together to Syracuse. By this time great
multitudes, also, from Italy and Sicily, had flocked in to Timoleon, so
that, as Athanis reports, their entire body amounted now to sixty
thousand men. Among these he divided the whole territory, and sold the
houses for a thousand talents; by which method, he both left it in the
power of the old Syracusans to redeem their own, and made it a means
also for raising a stock for the community, which had been so much
impoverished of late, and was so unable to defray other expenses, and
especially those of a war, that they exposed their very statues to
sale, a regular process being observed, and sentence of auction passed
upon each of them by majority of votes, as if they had been so many
criminals taking their trial: in the course of which it is said that
while condemnation was pronounced upon all other statues, that of the
ancient usurper Gelo was exempted, out of admiration and honor and for
the sake of the victory he gained over the Carthaginian forces at the
river Himera.

Syracuse being thus happily revived, and replenished again by
the general concourse of inhabitants from all parts, Timoleon was
desirous now to rescue other cities from the like bondage, and wholly
and once for all to extirpate arbitrary government out of Sicily. And
for this purpose, marching into the territories of those that used it,
he compelled Hicetes first to renounce the Carthaginian interest, and,
demolishing the fortresses which were held by him, to live henceforth
among the Leontinians as a private person. Leptines, also, the tyrant
of Apollonia and divers other little towns, after some resistance made,
seeing the danger he was in of being taken by force, surrendered
himself; upon which Timoleon spared his life, and sent him away to
Corinth, counting it a glorious thing that the mother city should
expose to the view of other Greeks these Sicilian tyrants, living now
in an exiled and a low condition. After this he returned to Syracuse,
that he might have leisure to attend to the establishment of the new
constitution, and assist Cephalus and Dionysius, who were sent from
Corinth to make laws, in determining the most important points of it.
In the meanwhile, desirous that his hired soldiers should not want
action, but might rather enrich themselves by some plunder from the
enemy, he dispatched Dinarchus and Demaretus with a portion of them
into the part of the island belonging to the Carthaginians, where they
obliged several cities to revolt from the barbarians, and not only
lived in great abundance themselves, but raised money from their spoil
to carry on the war.

Meantime, the Carthaginians landed at the promontory of
Lilybæum, bringing with them an army of seventy thousand men on board
two hundred galleys, besides a thousand other vessels laden with
engines of battery, chariots, corn, and other military stores, as if
they did not intend to manage the war by piecemeal and in parts as
heretofore, but to drive the Greeks altogether and at once out of all
Sicily. And indeed it was a force sufficient to overpower the
Siceliots, even though they had been at perfect union among themselves,
and had never been enfeebled by intestine quarrels. Hearing that part
of their subject territory was suffering devastation, they forthwith
made toward the Corinthians with great fury, having Asdrubal and
Hamilcar for their generals; the report of whose numbers and strength
coming suddenly to Syracuse, the citizens were so terrified, that
hardly three thousand, among so many myriads of them, had the courage
to take up arms and join Timoleon. The foreigners, serving for pay,
were not above four thousand in all, and about a thousand of these grew
fainthearted by the way, and forsook Timoleon in his march towards the
enemy, looking on him as frantic and distracted, destitute of the sense
which might have been expected from his time of life, thus to venture
out against an army of seventy thousand men, with no more than five
thousand foot and a thousand horse; and, when he should have kept those
forces to defend the city, choosing rather to remove them eight days’
journey from Syracuse, so that if they were beaten from the field, they
would have no retreat, nor any burial if they fell upon it. Timoleon,
however, reckoned it some kind of advantage, that these had thus
discovered themselves before the battle, and, encouraging the rest, led
them with all speed to the river Crimesus, where it was told him the
Carthaginians were drawn together.

As he was marching up an ascent, from the top of which they
expected to have a view of the army and of the strength of the enemy,
there met him by chance a train of mules loaded with parsley; which his
soldiers conceived to be an ominous occurrence or ill-boding token,
because this is the herb with which we not unfrequently adorn the
sepulchres of the dead; and there is a proverb derived from the custom,
used of one who is dangerously sick, that he has need of nothing but
parsley. So, to ease their minds, and free them from any superstitious
thoughts or forebodings of evil, Timoleon halted, and concluded an
address, suitable to the occasion, by saying, that a garland of triumph
was here luckily brought them, and had fallen into their hands of its
own accord, as an anticipation of victory: the same with which the
Corinthians crown the victors in the Isthmian games, accounting
chaplets of parsley the sacred wreath proper to their country; parsley
being at that time still the emblem of victory at the Isthmian, as it
is now at the Nemean sports; and it is not so very long ago that the
pine first began to be used in its place.

Timoleon, therefore, having thus bespoke his soldiers, took
part of the parsley, and with it made himself a chaplet first, his
captains and their companies all following the example of their leader.
The soothsayers then, observing also two eagles on the wing towards
them, one of which bore a snake struck through with her talons, and the
other, as she flew, uttered a loud cry indicating boldness and
assurance, at once showed them to the soldiers, who with one consent
fell to supplicate the gods, and call them in to their assistance. It
was now about the beginning of summer, and conclusion of the month
called Thargelion, not far from the solstice; and the river sending up
a thick mist, all the adjacent plain was at first darkened with the
fog, so that for a while they could discern nothing from the enemy’s
camp; only a confused buzz and undistinguished mixture of voices came
up to the hill from the distant motions and clamors of so vast a
multitude. When the Corinthians had mounted, and stood on the top, and
had laid down their bucklers to take breath and repose themselves, the
sun coming round and drawing up the vapors from below, the gross foggy
air that was now gathered and condensed above formed in a cloud upon
the mountains; and, all the under places being clear and open, the
river Crimesus appeared to them again, and they could descry the
enemies passing over it, first with their formidable four horse
chariots of war, and then ten thousand footmen bearing white shields,
whom they guessed to be all Carthaginians, from the splendor of their
arms, and the slowness and order of their march. And when now the
troops of various other nations, flowing in behind them, began to
throng for passage in a tumultuous and unruly manner, Timoleon,
perceiving that the river gave them opportunity to single off whatever
number of their enemies they had a mind to engage at once, and bidding
his soldiers observe how their forces were divided into two separate
bodies by the intervention of the stream, some being already over, and
others still to ford it, gave Demaretus command to fall in upon the
Carthaginians with his horse, and disturb their ranks before they
should be drawn up into form of battle; and coming down into the plain
himself, forming his right and left wing of other Sicilians,
intermingling only a few strangers in each, he placed the natives of
Syracuse in the middle, with the stoutest mercenaries he had about his
own person; and, waiting a little to observe the action of his horse,
when he saw they were not only hindered from grappling with the
Carthaginians by the armed chariots that ran to and fro before the
army, but forced continually to wheel about to escape having their
ranks broken, and so to repeat their charges anew, he took his buckler
in his hand, and crying out to the foot that they should follow him
with courage and confidence, he seemed to speak with a more than human
accent, and a voice stronger than ordinary; whether it were that he
naturally raised it so high in the vehemence and ardor of his mind to
assault the enemy, or else, as many then thought, some god or other
spoke with him. When his soldiers quickly gave an echo to it, all
besought him to lead them on without any further delay, he made a sign
to the horse, that they should draw off from the front where the
chariots were, and pass sidewards to attack their enemies in the flank;
then, making his vanguard firm by joining man to man and buckler to
buckler, he caused the trumpet to sound, and so bore in upon the
Carthaginians.

They, for their part, stoutly received and sustained his first
onset; and having their bodies armed with breastplates of iron, and
helmets of brass on their heads, besides great bucklers to cover and
secure them, they could easily repel the charge of the Greek spears.
But when the business came to a decision by the sword, where mastery
depends no less upon art than strength, all on a sudden from the
mountain tops violent peals of thunder and vivid dashes of lightning
broke out; following upon which the darkness, that had been hovering
about the higher grounds and the crests of the hills, descending to the
place of battle and bringing a tempest of rain and of wind and hail
along with it, was driven upon the Greeks behind, and fell only at
their backs, but discharged itself in the very faces of the barbarians,
the rain beating on them, and the lightning dazzling them without
cessation; annoyances that in many ways distressed at any rate the
inexperienced, who had not been used to such hardships, and, in
particular, the claps of thunder, and the noise of the rain and hail
beating on their arms, kept them from hearing the commands of their
officers. Besides which, the very mud also was a great hindrance to the
Carthaginians, who were not lightly equipped, but, as I said before,
loaded with heavy armor; and then their shirts underneath getting
drenched, the foldings about the bosom filled with water, grew unwieldy
and cumbersome to them as they fought, and made it easy for the Greeks
to throw them down, and, when they were once down, impossible for them,
under that weight, to disengage themselves and rise again with weapons
in their hand. The river Crimesus, too, swollen partly by the rain, and
partly by the stoppage of its course with the numbers that were passing
through, overflowed its banks; and the level ground by the side of it,
being so situated as to have a number of small ravines and hollows of
the hill-side descending upon it, was now filled with rivulets and
currents that had no certain channel, in which the Carthaginians
stumbled and rolled about, and found themselves in great difficulty. So
that, in fine, the storm bearing still upon them, and the Greeks having
cut in pieces four hundred men of their first ranks, the whole body of
their army began to fly. Great numbers were overtaken in the plain, and
put to the sword there; and many of them, as they were making their way
back through the river, falling foul upon others that were yet coming
over, were borne away and overwhelmed by the waters; but the major
part, attempting to get up the hills and so make their escape, were
intercepted and destroyed by the light-armed troops. It is said, that
of ten thousand who lay dead after the fight, three thousand, at least,
were Carthaginian citizens; a heavy loss and great grief to their
countrymen; those that fell being men inferior to none among them as to
birth, wealth, or reputation. Nor do their records mention that so many
native Carthaginians were ever cut off before in any one battle; as
they usually employed Africans, Spaniards, and Numidians in their wars,
so that if they chanced to be defeated, it was still at the cost and
damage of other nations.

The Greeks easily discovered of what condition and account the
slain were, by the richness of their spoils; for when they came to
collect the booty, there was little reckoning made either of brass or
iron, so abundant were better metals, and so common were silver and
gold Passing over the river, they became masters of their camp and
carriages. As for captives, a great many of them were stolen away, and
sold privately by the soldiers, but about five thousand were brought in
and delivered up for the benefit of the public; two hundred of their
chariots of war were also taken. The tent of Timoleon then presented a
most glorious and magnificent appearance, being heaped up and hung
round with every variety of spoils and military ornaments, among which
there were a thousand breastplates of rare workmanship and beauty, and
bucklers to the number of ten thousand. The victors being but few to
strip so many that were vanquished, and having such valuable booty to
occupy them, it was the third day after the fight before they could
erect and finish the trophy of their conquest. Timoleon sent tidings of
his victory to Corinth, with the best and goodliest arms he had taken
as a proof of it; that he thus might render his country an object of
emulation to the whole world, when, of all the cities of Greece, men
should there alone behold the chief temples adorned, not with Grecian
spoils, nor offerings obtained by the bloodshed and plunder of their
own countrymen and kindred, and attended, therefore, with sad and
unhappy remembrances, but with such as had been stripped from
barbarians and enemies to their nation, with the noblest titles
inscribed upon them, titles telling of the justice as well as fortitude
of the conquerors; namely, that the people of Corinth, and Timoleon
their general, having redeemed the Greeks of Sicily from Carthaginian
bondage, made oblation of these to the gods, in grateful acknowledgment
of their favor.

Having done this, he left his hired soldiers in the enemy’s
country, to drive and carry away all they could throughout the
subject-territory of Carthage, and so marched with the rest of his army
to Syracuse, where he issued an edict for banishing the thousand
mercenaries who had basely deserted him before the battle, and obliged
them to quit the city before sunset. They, sailing into Italy, lost
their lives there by the hands of the Bruttians, in spite of a public
assurance of safety previously given them; thus receiving, from the
divine power, a just reward of their own treachery. Mamercus, however,
the tyrant of Catana, and Hicetes, after all, either envying Timoleon
the glory of his exploits, or fearing him as one that would keep no
agreement, nor have any peace with tyrants, made a league with the
Carthaginians, and pressed them much to send a new army and commander
into Sicily, unless they would be content to hazard all, and to be
wholly ejected out of that island. And in consequence of this, Gisco
was dispatched with a navy of seventy sail. He took numerous Greek
mercenaries also into pay, that being the first time they had ever been
enlisted for the Carthaginian service; but then it seems the
Carthaginians began to admire them, as the most irresistible soldiers
of all mankind. Uniting their forces in the territory of Messena, they
cut off four hundred of Timoleon’s paid soldiers, and within the
dependencies of Carthage, at a place called Hieræ, destroyed, by an
ambuscade, the whole body of mercenaries that served under Euthymus the
Leucadian; which accidents, however, made the good fortune of Timoleon
accounted all the more remarkable, as these were the men that, with
Philomelus of Phocis and Onomarchus, had forcibly broken into the
temple of Apollo at Delphi, and were partakers with them in the
sacrilege; so that, being hated and shunned by all, as persons under a
curse, they were constrained to wander about in Peloponnesus; when, for
want of others, Timoleon was glad to take them into service in his
expedition for Sicily, where they were successful in whatever
enterprise they attempted under his conduct. But now, when all the
important dangers were past, on his sending them out for the relief and
defense of his party in several places, they perished and were
destroyed at a distance from him, not all together, but in small
parties; and the vengeance which was destined for them, so
accommodating itself to the good fortune which guarded Timoleon as not
to allow any harm or prejudice for good men to arise from the
punishment of the wicked, the benevolence and kindness which the gods
had for Timoleon was thus as distinctly recognized in his disasters as
in his successes.

What most annoyed the Syracusans was their being insulted and
mocked by the tyrants; as, for example, by Mamercus, who valued himself
much upon his gift for writing poems and tragedies, and took occasion,
when coming to present the gods with the bucklers of the hired soldiers
whom he had killed, to make a boast of his victory in an insulting
elegiac inscription:—

“These shields, with purple, gold, and ivory wrought,
Were won by us that but with poor ones fought.”

After this, while Timoleon marched to Calauria, Hicetes made an
inroad into the borders of Syracuse, where he met with considerable
booty, and having done much mischief and havoc, returned back by
Calauria itself, in contempt of Timoleon, and the slender force he had
then with him. He, suffering Hicetes to pass forward, pursued him with
his horsemen and light infantry, which Hicetes perceiving, crossed the
river Damyrias, and then stood in a posture to receive him; the
difficulty of the passage, and the height and steepness of the bank on
each side, giving advantage enough to make him confident. A strange
contention and dispute, meantime, among the officers of Timoleon, a
little retarded the conflict; no one of them was willing to let another
pass over before him to engage the enemy; each man claiming it as a
right, to venture first and begin the onset; so that their fording was
likely to be tumultuous and without order, a mere general struggle
which should be the foremost. Timoleon, therefore, desiring to decide
the quarrel by lot, took a ring from each of the pretenders, which he
cast into his own cloak, and, after he had shaken all together, the
first he drew out had, by good fortune, the figure of a trophy engraved
as a seal upon it; at the sight of which the young captains all shouted
for joy, and, without waiting any longer to see how chance would
determine it for the rest, took every man his way through the river
with all the speed they could make, and fell to blows with the enemies,
who were not able to bear up against the violence of their attack, but
fled in haste and left their arms behind them all alike, and a thousand
dead upon the place.

Not long after, Timoleon, marching up to the city of the
Leontines, took Hicetes alive, and his son Eupolemus, and Euthymus, the
commander of his horse, who were bound and brought to him by their own
soldiers. Hicetes and the stripling his son were then executed as
tyrants and traitors; and Euthymus, though a brave man, and one of
singular courage, could obtain no mercy, because he was charged with
contemptuous language in disparagement of the Corinthians when they
first sent their forces into Sicily: it is said that he told the
Leontini in a speech, that the news did not sound terrible, nor was any
great danger to be feared because of—

“Corinthian women coming out of doors.”

So true is it that men are usually more stung and galled by
reproachful words than hostile actions; and they bear an affront with
less patience than an injury; to do harm and mischief by deeds is
counted pardonable from enemies, as nothing less can be expected in a
state of war; whereas virulent and contumelious words appear to be the
expression of needless hatred, and to proceed from an excess of rancor.

When Timoleon came back to Syracuse, the citizens brought the
wives and daughters of Hicetes and his son to a public trial, and
condemned and put them to death. This seems to be the least pleasing
action of Timoleon’s life; since if he had interposed, the unhappy
women would have been spared. He would appear to have disregarded the
thing, and to have given them up to the citizens, who were eager to
take vengeance for the wrongs done to Dion, who expelled Dionysius;
since it was this very Hicetes, who took Arete the wife, and
Aristomache the sister of Dion, with a son that had not yet passed his
childhood, and threw them all together into the sea alive, as related
in the life of Dion.

After this, he moved towards Catana against Mamercus, who gave him
battle near the river Abolus, and was overthrown and put to flight,
losing above two thousand men, a considerable part of whom were the
Phœnician troops sent by Gisco to his assistance. After this defeat,
the Carthaginians sued for peace; which was granted on the conditions
that they should confine themselves to the country within the river
Lycus, that those of the inhabitants who wished to remove to the
Syracusan territories should be allowed to depart with their whole
families and fortunes, and, lastly, that Carthage should renounce all
engagements to the tyrants. Mamercus, now forsaken and despairing of
success, took ship for Italy with the design of bringing in the
Lucanians against Timoleon and the people of Syracuse; but the men in
his galleys turning back and landing again and delivering up Catana to
Timoleon, thus obliged him to fly for his own safety to Messena, where
Hippo was tyrant. Timoleon, however, coming up against them, and
besieging the city both by sea and land, Hippo, fearful of the event,
endeavored to slip away in a vessel; which the people of Messena
surprised as it was putting off, and seizing on his person, and
bringing all their children from school into the theater, to witness
the glorious spectacle of a tyrant punished, they first publicly
scourged and then put him to death. Mamercus made surrender of himself
to Timoleon, with the proviso, that he should be tried at Syracuse, and
Timoleon should take no part in his accusation. Thither he was brought
accordingly, and presenting himself to plead before the people, he
essayed to pronounce an oration he had long before composed in his own
defense; but finding himself interrupted by noise and clamors, and
observing from their aspect and demeanor that the assembly was
inexorable, he threw off his upper garment, and running across the
theater as hard as he could, dashed his head against one of the stones
under the seats with intention to have killed himself; but he had not
the fortune to perish, as he designed, but was taken up alive, and
suffered the death of a robber.

Thus did Timoleon cut the nerves of tyranny, and put a period
to their wars; and, whereas, at his first entering upon Sicily, the
island was as it were become wild again, and was hateful to the very
natives on account of the evils and miseries they suffered there, he so
civilized and restored it, and rendered it so desirable to all men,
that even strangers now came by sea to inhabit those towns and places
which their own citizens had formerly forsaken and left desolate.
Agrigentum and Gela, two famous cities that had been ruined and laid
waste by the Carthaginians after the Attic war, were then peopled
again, the one by Megellus and Pheristus from Elea, the other by
Gorgus, from the island of Ceos, partly with new settlers, partly with
the old inhabitants whom they collected again from various parts; to
all of whom Timoleon not only afforded a secure and peaceable abode
after so obstinate a war, but was further so zealous in assisting and
providing for them that he was honored among them as their founder.
Similar feelings also possessed to such a degree all the rest of the
Sicilians, that there was no proposal for peace, nor reformation of
laws, nor assignation of land, nor reconstitution of government, which
they could think well of, unless he lent his aid as a chief architect,
to finish and adorn the work, and superadd some touches from his own
hand, which might render it pleasing both to God and man.

Although Greece had in his time produced several persons of
extraordinary worth, and much renowned for their achievements, such as
Timotheus and Agesilaus and Pelopidas and (Timoleon’s chief model)
Epaminondas, yet the lustre of their best actions was obscured by a
degree of violence and labor, insomuch that some of them were matter of
blame and of repentance; whereas there is not any one act of
Timoleon’s, setting aside the necessity he was placed under in
reference to his brother, to which, as Timæus observes, we may not
fitly apply that exclamation of Sophocles—

“O gods! what Venus, or what grace divine,
Did here with human workmanship combine?”

For as the poetry of Antimachus, and the painting of Dionysius,
the artists of Colophon, though full of force and vigor, yet appeared
to be strained and elaborate in comparison with the pictures of
Nicomachus and the verses of Homer, which, besides their general
strength and beauty, have the peculiar charm of seeming to have been
executed with perfect ease and readiness; so the expeditions and acts
of Epaminondas or Agesilaus, that were full of toil and effort, when
compared with the easy and natural as well as noble and glorious
achievements of Timoleon, compel our fair and unbiased judgment to
pronounce the latter not indeed the effect of fortune, but the success
of fortunate merit. Though he himself indeed ascribed that success to
the sole favor of fortune; and both in the letters which he wrote to
his friends at Corinth, and in the speeches he made to the people of
Syracuse, he would say, that he was thankful unto God, who, designing
to save Sicily, was pleased to honor him with the name and title of the
deliverance he vouchsafed it. And having built a chapel in his house,
he there sacrificed to Good Hap, as a deity that had favored him, and
devoted the house itself to the Sacred Genius; it being a house which
the Syracusans had selected for him, as a special reward and monument
of his brave exploits, granting him together with it the most agreeable
and beautiful piece of land in the whole country, where he kept his
residence for the most part, and enjoyed a private life with his wife
and children, who came to him from Corinth. For he returned thither no
more, unwilling to be concerned in the broils and tumults of Greece, or
to expose himself to public envy (the fatal mischief which great
commanders continually run into, from the insatiable appetite for
honors and authority); but wisely chose to spend the remainder of his
days in Sicily, and there partake of the blessings he himself had
procured, the greatest of which was, to behold so many cities flourish,
and so many thousands of people live happy through his means.

As, however, not only, as Simonides says, “On every lark must
grow a crest,” but also in every democracy there must spring up a false
accuser, so was it at Syracuse: two of their popular spokesmen,
Laphystius and Demænetus by name, fell to slander Timoleon. The former
of whom requiring him to put in sureties that he would answer to an
indictment that would be brought against him, Timoleon would not suffer
the citizens, who were incensed at this demand, to oppose it or hinder
the proceeding, since he of his own accord had been, he said, at all
that trouble, and run so many dangerous risks for this very end and
purpose, that every one who wished to try matters by law should freely
have recourse to it. And when Demænetus, in a full audience of the
people, laid several things to his charge which had been done while he
was general, he made no other reply to him, but only said he was much
indebted to the gods for granting the request he had so often made
them, namely, that he might live to see the Syracusans enjoy that
liberty of speech which they now seemed to be masters of.

Timoleon, therefore, having by confession of all done the
greatest and the noblest things of any Greek of his age, and alone
distinguished himself in those actions to which their orators and
philosophers, in their harangues and panegyrics at their solemn
national assemblies, used to exhort and incite the Greeks, and being
withdrawn beforehand by happy fortune, unspotted and without blood,
from the calamities of civil war, in which ancient Greece was soon
after involved; having also given full proof, as of his sage conduct
and manly courage to the barbarians and tyrants, so of his justice and
gentleness to the Greeks, and his friends in general; having raised,
too, the greater part of those trophies he won in battle, without any
tears shed or any mourning worn by the citizens either of Syracuse or
Corinth, and within less than eight years’ space delivered Sicily from
its inveterate grievances and intestine distempers, and given it up
free to the native inhabitants, began, as he was now growing old, to
find his eyes fail, and awhile after became perfectly blind. Not that
he had done anything himself which might occasion this defect, or was
deprived of his sight by any outrage of fortune; it seems rather to
have been some inbred and hereditary weakness that was founded in
natural causes, which by length of time came to discover itself. For it
is said, that several of his kindred and family were subject to the
like gradual decay, and lost all use of their eyes, as he did, in their
declining years. Athanis the historian tells us, that even during the
war against Hippo and Mamercus, while he was in his camp at Mylæ, there
appeared a white speck within his eye, from whence all could foresee
the deprivation that was coming on him; this, however, did not hinder
him then from continuing the siege, and prosecuting the war, till he
got both the tyrants into his power; but upon his coming back to
Syracuse, he presently resigned the authority of sole commander, and
besought the citizens to excuse him from any further service, since
things were already brought to so fair an issue. Nor is it so much to
be wondered, that he himself should bear the misfortune without any
marks of trouble; but the respect and gratitude which the Syracusans
showed him when he was entirely blind, may justly deserve our
admiration. They used to go themselves to visit him in troops, and
brought all the strangers that traveled through their country to his
house and manor, that they also might have the pleasure to see their
noble benefactor; making it the great matter of their joy and
exultation, that when, after so many brave and happy exploits, he might
have returned with triumph into Greece, he should disregard all the
glorious preparations that were there made to receive him, and choose
rather to stay here and end his days among them. Of the various things
decreed and done in honor of Timoleon, I consider one most signal
testimony to have been the vote which they passed, that, whenever they
should be at war with any foreign nation, they should make use of none
but a Corinthian general. The method, also, of their proceeding in
council, was a noble demonstration of the same deference for his
person. For, determining matters of less consequence themselves, they
always called him to advise in the more difficult cases, and such as
were of greater moment. He was, on these occasions, carried through the
market-place in a litter, and brought in, sitting, into the theater,
where the people with one voice saluted him by his name; and then,
after returning the courtesy, and pausing for a time, till the noise of
their gratulations and blessings began to cease, he heard the business
in debate, and delivered his opinion. This being confirmed by a general
suffrage, his servants went back with the litter through the midst of
the assembly, the people waiting on him out with acclamations and
applauses, and then returning to consider other public matters, which
they could dispatch in his absence. Being thus cherished in his old
age, with all the respect and tenderness due to a common father, he was
seized with a very slight indisposition, which however was sufficient,
with the aid of time, to put a period to his life. There was an
allotment then of certain days given, within the space of which the
Syracusans were to provide whatever should be necessary for his burial,
and all the neighboring country people and strangers were to make their
appearance in a body; so that the funeral pomp was set out with great
splendor and magnificence in all other respects, and the bier, decked
with ornaments and trophies, was borne by a select body of young men
over that ground where the palace and castle of Dionysius stood, before
they were demolished by Timoleon. There attended on the solemnity
several thousands of men and women, all crowned with flowers, and
arrayed in fresh and clean attire, which made it look like the
procession of a public festival; while the language of all, and their
tears mingling with their praise and benediction of the dead Timoleon,
manifestly showed that it was not any superficial honor, or commanded
homage, which they paid him, but the testimony of a just sorrow for his
death, and the expression of true affection. The bier at length being
placed upon the pile of wood that was kindled to consume his corpse,
Demetrius, one of their loudest criers, proceeded to read a
proclamation to the following purpose: “The people of Syracuse has made
a special decree to inter Timoleon, the son of Timodemus, the
Corinthian, at the common expense of two hundred minas, and to honor
his memory forever, by the establishment of annual prizes to be
competed for in music, and horse races, and all sorts of bodily
exercise; and this, because he suppressed the tyrants, overthrew the
barbarians, replenished the principal cities, that were desolate, with
new inhabitants, and then restored the Sicilian Greeks to the privilege
of living by their own laws.” Besides this, they made a tomb for him in
the marketplace, which they afterwards built round with colonnades, and
attached to it places of exercise for the young men, and gave it the
name of the Timoleonteum. And keeping to that form and order of civil
policy and observing those laws and constitutions which he left them,
they lived themselves a long time in great prosperity.